Sonnet IV: Why, When I Gaze

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1. Sonnet XII: Now, O'er the Tesselated Pavement Now, o’er the tessellated pavement strew Fresh saffron, steep’d in essence of the rose, While down yon agate column gently flows A glitt’ring streamlet of ambrosial dew! My Phaon smiles! the rich carnation’s hue, On his flush’d cheek in conscious lustre glows, While o’er his breast enamour’d Venus throws Her starry mantle of celestial blue! […]...
2. Sonnet XIV: Come, Soft Aeolian Harp Come, soft Aeolian harp, while zephyr plays Along the meek vibration of thy strings, As twilight’s hand her modest mantle brings, Blending with sober grey, the western blaze! O! prompt my Phaon’s dreams with tend’rest lays, Ere night o’er shade thee with its humid wings, While the lorn Philomel his sorrow sings In leafy cradle, […]...
3. 467. Inscription to Miss Graham of Fintry HERE, where the Scottish Muse immortal lives, In sacred strains and tuneful numbers joined, Accept the gift; though humble he who gives, Rich is the tribute of the grateful mind. So may no ruffian-feeling in my breast, Discordant, jar thy bosom-chords among; But Peace attune thy gentle soul to rest, Or Love, ecstatic, wake his […]...
4. Sonnet XXV: Can'st Thou Forget Can’st thou forget, O! Idol of my Soul! Thy Sappho’s voice, her form, her dulcet Lyre! That melting ev’ry thought to fond desire, Bade sweet delerium o’er thy senses roll? Can’st thou, so soon, renounce the blest control That calm’d with pity’s tears love’s raging fire, While Hope, slow breathing on the trembling wire, In […]...
5. Sonnet XXXIX: Prepare Your Wreaths Prepare your wreaths, Aonian maids divine, To strew the tranquil bed where I shall sleep; In tears, the myrtle and the laurel steep, And let Erato’s hand the trophies twine. No parian marble, there, with labour’d line, Shall bid the wand’ring lover stay to weep; There holy silence shall her vigils keep. Save, when the […]...
6. Absence WHEN from the craggy mountain’s pathless steep, Whose flinty brow hangs o’er the raging sea, My wand’ring eye beholds the foamy deep, I mark the restless surge­and think of THEE. The curling waves, the passing breezes move, Changing and treach’rous as the breath of LOVE; The “sad similitude” awakes my smart, And thy dear image […]...
7. Sonnet VIII: Why, Through Each Aching Vein Why, through each aching vein, with lazy pace Thus steals the languid fountain of my heart, While, from its source, each wild convulsive start Tears the scorch’d roses from my burning face? In vain, O Lesbian Vales! your charms I trace; Vain is the poet’s theme, the sculptor’s art; No more the Lyre its magic […]...
8. Sonnet I: Favour'd by Heav'n Favour’d by Heav’n are those, ordain’d to taste The bliss supreme that kindles fancy’s fire; Whose magic fingers sweep the muses’ lyre, In varying cadence, eloquently chaste! Well may the mind, with tuneful numbers grac’d, To Fame’s immortal attributes aspire, Above the treach’rous spells of low desire, That wound the sense, by vulgar joys debas’d. […]...
9. 459. Sonnet on the Death of Robert Riddell NO more, ye warblers of the wood! no more; Nor pour your descant grating on my soul; Thou young-eyed Spring! gay in thy verdant stole, More welcome were to me grim Winter’s wildest roar. How can ye charm, ye flowers, with all your dyes? Ye blow upon the sod that wraps my friend! How can […]...
10. Away, Delights AWAY, delights! go seek some other dwelling, For I must die. Farewell, false love! thy tongue is ever telling Lie after lie. For ever let me rest now from thy smarts; Alas, for pity go And fire their hearts That have been hard to thee! Mine was not so. Never again deluding love shall know […]...
11. Lullaby Now the day is done, Now the shepherd sun Drives his white flocks from the sky; Now the flowers rest On their mother’s breast, Hushed by her low lullaby. Now the glowworms glance, Now the fireflies dance, Under fern-boughs green and high; And the western breeze To the forest trees Chants a tuneful lullaby. Now […]...
12. Sonnet XXXI: Far O'er the Waves Far o’er the waves my lofty Bark shall glide, Love’s frequent sighs the flutt’ring sails shall swell, While to my native home I bid farewell, Hope’s snowy hand the burnis’d helm shall guide! Triton’s shall sport admidst the yielding tide, Myriads of Cupids round the prow shall dwell, And Venus, thron’d within her opal shell, […]...
13. Sonnet LII: What? Dost Thou Mean What? Dost thou mean to cheat me of my heart? To take all mine and give me none again? Or have thine eyes such magic or that art That what they get they ever do retain? Play not the tyrant, but take some remorse; Rebate thy spleen, if but for pity’s sake; Or, cruel, if […]...
14. EXOTIC PERFUME WHEN with closed eyes in autumn’s eves of gold I breathe the burning odours of your breast, Before my eyes the hills of happy rest Bathed in the sun’s monotonous fires, unfold. Islands of Lethe where exotic boughs Bend with their burden of strange fruit bowed down, Where men are upright, maids have never grown […]...
15. Sonnet CXII Your love and pity doth the impression fill Which vulgar scandal stamp’d upon my brow; For what care I who calls me well or ill, So you o’er-green my bad, my good allow? You are my all the world, and I must strive To know my shames and praises from your tongue: None else to […]...
16. Sonnet XL: On the Low Margin On the low margin of a murm’ring stream, As rapt in meditation’s arms I lay; Each aching sense in slumbers stole away, While potent fancy form’d a soothing dream; O’er the Leucadian deep, a dazzling beam Shed the bland light of empyrean day! But soon transparent shadows veil’d each ray, While mystic visions sprang athwart […]...
17. Morning-Land Old English songs, you bring to me A simple sweetness somewhat kin To birds that through the mystery Of earliest morn make tuneful din, While hamlet steeples sleepily At cock-crow chime out three and four, Till maids get up betime and go With faces like the red sun low Clattering about the dairy floor....
18. Sonnet 112: Your love and pity doth th' impression fill Your love and pity doth th’ impression fill Which vulgar scandal stamped upon my brow; For what care I who calls me well or ill, So you o’ergreen my bad, my good allow? You are my all the world, and I must strive To know my shames and praises from your tongue; None else to […]...
19. Sonnet to the Memory of Miss Maria Linley So bends beneath the storm yon balmy flow’r, Whose spicy blossoms once perfum’d the gale; So press’d with tears reclines yon lily pale, Obedient to the rude and beating show’r. Still is the LARK, that hov’ring o’er yon spray, With jocund carol usher’d in the morn; And mute the NIGHTINGALE, whose tender lay Melted the […]...
20. Oberon to the Queen of the Fairies My OBERON, with ev’ry sprite “That gilds the vapours of the night, “Shall dance and weave the verdant ring “With joy that mortals thus can sing; “And when thou sigh’st MARIA’S name, “And mourn’st to feel a hopeless flame, “Eager they’ll catch the tender note “Just parting from thy tuneful throat, “And bear it to […]...
21. Sonnet CXI O, for my sake do you with Fortune chide, The guilty goddess of my harmful deeds, That did not better for my life provide Than public means which public manners breeds. Thence comes it that my name receives a brand, And almost thence my nature is subdued To what it works in, like the dyer’s […]...
22. Sonnet 111: O, for my sake do you with Fortune chide O, for my sake do you with Fortune chide, The guilty goddess of my harmful deeds, That did not better for my life provide Than public means which public manners breeds. Thence comes it that my name receives a brand, And almost thence my nature is subdued To what it works in, like the dyer’s […]...
23. Sonnet CXI: O, for my sake do you with Fortune chide O, for my sake do you with Fortune chide, The guilty goddess of my harmful deeds, That did not better for my life provide Than public means which public manners breeds. Thence comes it that my name receives a brand, And almost thence my nature is subdu’d To what it works in, like the dyer’s […]...
24. To Cesario CESARIO, thy Lyre’s dulcet measure, So sweetly, so tenderly flows; That could my sad soul taste of pleasure, Thy music would soften its woes. But ah, gentle soother, where anguish Takes root in the grief-stricken heart; ‘Tis the triumph of sorrow to languish, ‘Tis rapture to cherish the smart. The mind where pale Mis’ry sits […]...
25. His Last Sonnet Bright star, would I were steadfast as thou art! – Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night, And watching, with eternal lids apart, Like Nature’s patient sleepless Eremite, The moving waters at their priestlike task Of pure ablution round earth’s human shores, Or gazing on the new soft fallen mask Of snow upon the […]...
26. Sonnet VII: Sweet Poet of the Woods Sweet poet of the woods – a long adieu! Farewel, soft minstrel of the early year! Ah! ’twill be long ere thou shalt sing anew, And pour thy music on the ‘night’s dull ear,’ Whether on spring thy wandering flights await, Or whether silent in our groves ye dwell, The pensive muse shall own thee […]...
27. Sonnet XXXV: What Means the Mist What means the mist opaque that veils these eyes; Why does yon threat’ning tempest shroud the day? Why does thy altar, Venus, fade away, And on my breast the dews of horror rise? Phaon is false! be dim ye orient Skies; And let black Erebus succeed your ray; Let clashing thunders roll, and lightning play; […]...
28. Sonnet XVIII: To This Our World To the Celestial Numbers To this our world, to Learning, and to Heav’n, Three Nines there are, to every one a Nine, One number of the Earth, the other both divine; One woman now makes three odd numbers ev’n. Nine Orders first of Angels be in Heav’n, Nine Muses do with Learning still frequent: These […]...
29. Sonnet LXVI: The Night-Flood Rakes The night-flood rakes upon the stony shore; Along the rugged cliffs and chalky caves Mourns the hoarse Ocean, seeming to deplore All that are buried in his restless waves- Mined by corrosive tides, the hollow rock Falls prone, and rushing from its turfy height, Shakes the broad beach with long-resounding shock, Loud thundering on the […]...
30. Sicilian Lullaby Hush, little one, and fold your hands; The sun hath set, the moon is high; The sea is singing to the sands, And wakeful posies are beguiled By many a fairy lullaby: Hush, little child, my little child! Dream, little one, and in your dreams Float upward from this lowly place, Float out on mellow, […]...
31. Dreams While on my lonely couch I lie, I seldom feel myself alone, For fancy fills my dreaming eye With scenes and pleasures of its own. Then I may cherish at my breast An infant’s form beloved and fair, May smile and soothe it into rest With all a Mother’s fondest care. How sweet to feel […]...
32. Modern Love XLIV: They Say That Pity They say, that Pity in Love’s service dwells, A porter at the rosy temple’s gate. I missed him going: but it is my fate To come upon him now beside his wells; Whereby I know that I Love’s temple leave, And that the purple doors have closed behind. Poor soul! if in those early days […]...
33. Elegy to the Memory of Richard Boyle, Esq NEAR yon bleak mountain’s dizzy height, That hangs o’er AVON’s silent wave; By the pale Crescent’s glimm’ring light, I sought LORENZO’s lonely grave. O’er the long grass the silv’ry dew, Soft Twilight’s tears spontaneous shone; And the dank bough of baneful yew Supply’d the place of sculptured stone. Oft, as my trembling steps drew near, […]...
34. The Tired Worker O whisper, O my soul! The afternoon Is waning into evening, whisper soft! Peace, O my rebel heart! for soon the moon From out its misty veil will swing aloft! Be patient, weary body, soon the night Will wrap thee gently in her sable sheet, And with a leaden sigh thou wilt invite To rest […]...
35. Sonnet to My Beloved Daughter WHEN FATE in ruthless rage assail’d my breast, And Heaven relentless seal’d the harsh decree; HOPE, placid soother of the mind distress’d; To calm my rending sorrows­gave me THEE. In all the charms of innocence array’d, ‘Tis thine to sprinkle patience on my woes; As from thy voice celestial comfort flows, Glancing bright lustre o’er […]...
36. Mary, Pity Women! You call yourself a man, For all you used to swear, An’ Leave me, as you can, My certain shame to bear? I’ear! You do not care You done the worst you know. I ‘ate you, grinnin’ there…. Ah, Gawd, I love you so! Nice while it lasted, an’ now it is over Tear out […]...
37. Sonnet XXXVII: When, in the Gloomy Mansion When, in the gloomy mansion of the dead, This with’ring heart, this faded form shall sleep; When these fond eyes, at length shall cease to weep, And earth’s cold lap receive this fev’rish head; Envy shall turn away, a tear to shed, And Time’s obliterating pinions sweep The spot, where poets shall their vigils keep, […]...
38. Sonnet XLI: Yes, I Will Go Yes, I will go, where circling whirlwinds rise, Where threat’ning clouds in sable grandeur lour; Where the blast yells, the liquid columns pour, And madd’ning billows combat with the skies! There, while the Daemon of the tempest flies On growing pinions through the troublous hour, The wild waves gasp impatient to devour, And on the […]...
39. Sorrow Why does the thin grey strand Floating up from the forgotten Cigarette between my fingers, Why does it trouble me? Ah, you will understand; When I carried my mother downstairs, A few times only, at the beginning Of her soft-foot malady, I should find, for a reprimand To my gaiety, a few long grey hairs […]...
40. Psalm 71 part 2 v.14-16,22-24 C. M. Christ our strength and righteousness. My Savior, my almighty Friend, When I begin thy praise, Where will the growing numbers end, The numbers of thy grace? Thou art my everlasting trust, Thy goodness I adore; And since I knew thy graces first, I speak thy glories more. My feet shall travel all […]...